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In a drive to boost revenue collections in government stadia, Sports Minister Henry Chimunthu Banda has directed that from now onwards, nobody will have the luxury of free entry regardless of status.
The minister said the directive follows recent revelations by the Football Association of Malawi (Fam) that only K1.2 million was realised from gate collections during the joint World Cup and Africa Nations Cup qualifier between the Flames and Tunisia at Kamuzu Stadium a fortnight ago.
Chimunthu Banda admitted that the money realised from the game did not represent the turn-up.
“Looking at the turn-up of the Tunisia game and to say only K1.2 million was realised is a big joke and to say that only two people paid at the VIP enclosure is even a bigger joke.
“It indeed creates room for suspicion and perhaps Fam’s allegations that it suspects serious fraud cannot be taken lightly,” said the minister.
He therefore said government has come up with some measures to try and improve on revenue collections during matches.
Chimunthu Banda said from now on everyone including very important persons (VIP) and journalists will no longer be allowed free entry.
“Everybody means everybody, be it a cabinet minister, member of parliament or journalists they will all be entitled to pay. There will be no exceptions because the moment you bring in exceptions, then you are creating room for loopholes.
“If a VIP or a journalist goes to a stadium on duty, his or her institution has to pay for them, after all VIP’s are capable people...I mean how can you be a VIP if you fail to pay entry fee when in actual fact a common man is able to pay?” wondered the minister.
He added: “The institutions that make one a VIP should be able to pay for their VIPs.”
Chimunthu Banda further said the government will also put in place an advance ticket selling system.
“The principle from now onwards is that tickets will be sold in advance because that is one way of curbing fraud because we will be able to estimate how much can be made from a game,” explained the minister.
He further said government is also exploring a possibility of contracting out the duty of handling tickets.
“We could use it on experimental basis and my ministry will communicate with Sports Council to alert associations so that they begin strategising,” said the minister.
Sports Journalists Association of Malawi (Spojam) head Chimwemwe Festino Jere said his body had some reservations on the minister’s directive that journalists should be paying to cover matches.
“We haven’t received the communication yet, but we have our reservations because journalists go there to cover matches. Of course there are other journalists who abuse the privilege by going to the stadium to watch games for free when they are not on duty.
“I think the main area where government needed to look into was the issue of fraud which is the biggest problem. Anyway we will sit down to look into the issue,” said Festino Jere.
Fam welcomed the minister’s move in an interview saying it is likely to improve the situation.
Fam executive member McCollins Chibvunde said: “We have all along been calling for advance ticket selling system and contracting out the handling
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